Any strata experts here?

[Jim]

Quick story:

My apartment/condo/whatever you want to call it, building is in need of balcony repairs. The building has 60 units. 59 units have balconies. I have the 1 unit that doesn't. The strata approved a special levy of $60,000 to repair balconies, of which I paid $900 (I didn't argue, because it wasn't a huge amount relatively). They also approved a lighting retrofit for common areas of the building to save energy. Since then, the owner of one unit, who is a contractor, posted a notice, and passed them out under doors that he had a deal or contract or something, to do the repairs and it could be done in the budget, but the strata president wanted his done first, he declined, because he wanted to do it properly, and now the council has decided not to get him to do the work. They have now notified us that the $60,000 will be returned (pending a special general meeting and approval), minus a $900 processing fee or something for the property management company, and will approve a building inspection from the contingency fund. So far nothing has been done, no balcony repairs, no lighting retrofit. The original special levy for balconies was based on unit entitlement decided by apartment square footage, even though each apartment (minus mine) has the same sized balcony. I am just looking for any advice regarding dealing with the strata, since it seems unfair I should pay for repairs to limited common property that I am the only one in the building who does not get to enjoy. I have been told by many people this sounds unfair, including other building residents. Other residents were also unhappy that they had to pay more for balcony repairs because of their bigger apartment, even though the balcony was the same size. From the sounds of it, it is going to end up costing more, once they have things inspected and go the new route, and I don't want to get dragged into costly balcony repairs if I don't have one and can avoid it.